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The journey is always the same, and never the same. As Ian Bostridge remarks, at the end of his prize-winning book Schubert’s Winter Journey: Anatomy of an Obsession, when the wanderer asks Der Leiermann, “Will you play your hurdy-gurdy to my songs?”, in the final song of Winterreise, the ‘crazy but logical procedure would be to go right back to the beginning of the whole cycle and start all over again’.

It felt rather decadent to be sitting in an opera house at 12pm. Even more so given the passion-fuelled excesses of Pietro Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana and Ruggero Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci, which might seem rather too sensual and savage for mid-day consumption.

Manitoba Opera opened its 45th season with Puccini’s Madama Butterfly proving that the aching heart as expressed through art knows no racial or cultural divide, with the Italian composer’s self-avowed favourite opera still able to spread its poetic wings across time and space since its Milan premiere in 1904.

In 1992, concert promoter Heinz Liebrecht introduced pianist Julius Drake to tenor Ian Bostridge and an acclaimed, inspiring musical partnership was born. On Wenlock Edge formed part of their first programme, at Holkham Hall in Norfolk; and, so, in this recital at Middle Temple Hall, celebrating their 25 years of music-making, the duo included Vaughan Williams’ Housman settings for tenor, piano and string quartet alongside works with a seventeenth-century origin or flavour.

Not many (maybe any) of the new operas presented by San Francisco Opera over the past 10 years would lure me to the War Memorial Opera House a second time around. But for Girls of the Golden West just now I would be there again tomorrow night and the next, and I am eagerly awaiting all future productions.

It’s taken a while for Rossini’s Semiramide to reach the Covent Garden stage. The last of the operas which Rossini composed for Italian theatres between 1810-1823, Semiramide has had only one outing at the Royal Opera House since 1887, and that was a concert version in 1986.

‘His master’s masterpiece, the work of heaven’: ‘a common fountain’ from which flow ‘pure silver drops’. At the risk of effulgent hyperbole, I’d suggest that Antonio’s image of the blessed governance and purifying power of the French court - in the opening scene of Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi - is also a perfect metaphor for the voice of French countertenor Philippe Jaroussky, as it slips through Handel’s roulades like a silken ribbon.

Here are five complete song sets by two of the greatest masters of French song. The performers are highly competent. I should have known, given the rave reviews that their 2015 recording of modern Norwegian songs received.

The opera world barely knows how to handle works that have significant amounts of spoken dialogue. Conductors and stage directors will often trim the dialogue to a bare minimum (Magic Flute), have it rendered as sung recitative (Carmen), or have it spoken in the vernacular though the sung numbers may often be performed in the original language (Die Fledermaus).

Here is the latest CD from a major label promoting a major new soprano. Aida Garifullina is utterly remarkable: a lyric soprano who also can handle coloratura with ease. Her tone has a constant shimmer, with a touch of quick, narrow vibrato even on short notes.

From the start of Lyric Opera of Chicago’s splendid, new production of Richard Wagner’s Die Walküre conflict and resolution are portrayed throughout with moving intensity. The central character Brünnhilde is sung by Christine Goerke and her father Wotan by Eric Owens.

Compared to the oft-explored world of German lieder and French chansons, the songs of Russia are unfairly neglected in recordings and in the concert hall. The raw emotion and expansive lyricism present in much of this repertoire was clearly in evidence at the Holywell Music Room for the penultimate day of the celebrated Oxford Lieder Festival.

This concert was an event on several levels - marking a decade since the death of Stockhausen, the fortieth anniversary (almost to the day) since Singcircle first performed STIMMUNG (at the Round House), and their final public performance of the piece. It was also a rare opportunity to hear (and see) Stockhausen’s last completed purely electronic work, COSMIC PULSES - an overwhelming visual and aural experience that anyone who was at this concert will long remember.

Bampton Classical Opera is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2017 Young Singers’ Competition is mezzo-soprano Emma Stannard and the runner-up is tenor Wagner Moreira. The winner of the accompanists’ prize, a new category this year, is Keval Shah.

With this recording of Mozart’s 1771 opera, Il sogno di Scipione (Sicpio’s Dream), Classical Opera continue their progress through the adolescent composer’s precocious achievements and take another step towards the fulfilment of their complete Mozart opera series for Signum Classics.

Reviews

09 Nov 2008

Ernani and I Capuletti e I Montecchi on Dynamic DVD

Both these performances come from mid-2005. Teatro Regio di Parma presented the Ernani in May of that year; August saw I Capuletti e I Montecchi on stage at the Festival della Valle d'Itria di Martina Franca.

Sound and picture are excellent for both, and the performances, while not first-class, feature solid singing and tasteful productions. Despite those merits, neither DVD makes for a truly satisfying experience. Verdi’s early hit should be more exciting; Bellini’s take on the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet could use more style. The catalog doesn’t exactly run over with these two titles, on the other hand.

As seems to be typical of most of the productions Dynamic chooses to film, the sets tend to the spartan - neither of these have much scenery or even props. The budget, apparently, goes to costumes. For Ernani, Pier’Alli’s gorgeous designs put the ladies in satins of metallic red and gold, while the men wear form-fitting tunics of coordinating leather. Beautiful to look at, they also inhibit easy movement, as well as expressing much more of the creator’s taste and imagination than anything about the drama or the characters.

Not helping matters is a cast of strong voices but little stage personality. In the heroic tenor lead, Marco Berti manages the notes with an able but colorless instrument. If he sang with greater individuality, perhaps your reviewer wouldn’t mind so much his bland appearance and stiff stage deportment. Susan Neves shows a little more life as the love interest, Elvira, but why she inspires such mad lust from every man who sees her remains a riddle. Her singing is unsubtle but when she pours out the volume, she makes some impressive sounds. Carlo Guelfi and Giacomo Prestia, as the dark-voiced “bad guys,” Don Carlo and Silva respectively, growl and bluster appropriately. Pier-Alli really needed to spend a little less time with the needle and thread and more getting some inspired movement on stage. The elemental passions of this early Verdi work are done no favors here. Conductor Antonello Allemandi has the right ideas, however, in the pit with the Parma forces.

For the Bellini, director/designer Denis Knef decided to update the tale of the star-crossed lovers to some vaguely early 20-th century setting. The unchanging backdrop of worn stone edifices suggests a plaza in Verona. The men wear caps and fedoras, with dark suits, and some carry rifles. The aim simply seems to be to put a fresh spin on the timeless tale (albeit one told with some key differences from Shakespeare’s version). In the end, the updating is harmless but meaningless. Bellini’s music never quite reaches the heights of his masterpieces, with only the last scene really touching deeper emotional levels. Nonetheless, the two leads, including a mezzo in the pants-role of Romeo, get many opportunities to shine, and both Patrizia Ciofi (Juliet) and Clara Polito (Romeo) make the most of them. As the tenor bad guy Tebaldo, Danilo Formaggio impresses with a handsome, sizeable mid-range and able top. It’s unfortunate to note that if he were better looking, he might have a lot more opportunity to expand his career. Luciano Acocella and the Orchestra Internazioale d’Italia support the singers admirably.

Perhaps if director/designers had been switched, we could have had a rougher, more scintillating Ernani and a lusher, more entrancing I Capuletti e I Montecchi. What we have instead is decent but not all that exciting.